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SICK CALL – THE CURE FOR GI GOLDBRICKERS

By Sgt. Allan Kleinwaks, Hawaii

Sick call is something that soldiers go on. More soldiers go on sick call than civilians on busses. The only thing that a soldier needs to go on sick call is a temperature over 90 degrees or a brilliant excuse. Soldiers who have KP one day and a date in town the next are most generally afflicted.

The gentlemen at the right dropped a lead pencil on his foot and was rushed to the dispensary in great pain, where he told the M.D. that a chunk of lead fell on his foot. The M.D. diagnosed the case as lead in the pants and is taking corrective measures, as is indicated by the bottle of castor oil.

Amateurs who persist in going on sick call are assigned a permanent spot in the latrine and are frequent guests.

Thermometers are shoved in everyone’s mouth, regardless of ailment. Fellows that go on sick call because they have a back that doesn’t ache, or a toothache that doesn’t hurt, or athlete’s foot that they don’t have, all wind up with a glass stem in their mouths.

Some dispensary orderlies are so skillful that they toss thermometers in the mouths from across the room. All good javelin tossers are trained in hospitals or dispensaries.

The two most common ailments that afflict soldiers are KP and P and P. Extensive research is now going on to determine why men who were in perfect health throughout their civilian lives suddenly come down with every illness once they get into the Army. There was a fellow down in Keesler Field who bragged that he had never been on sick call. When the doctors heard about it they rushed him straight to the hospital, and he turned out to be some genuine case that had come along since the Selective Service Act was put into effect.